


But Like a Refugee

by fizzygingr



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Discussion of Torture, Flashbacks, Forced to kill, M/M, Matt Holt has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Panic Attacks, Shiro (Voltron) Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Shiro (Voltron) killed people, Shiro (Voltron)'s Missing Year, discussed but not shown, discussion of manipulation, discussion of trauma, he also has some of my own specific brain issues because that's what fic is for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 03:51:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18003275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fizzygingr/pseuds/fizzygingr
Summary: Matt tries to clean up the mess he made and comfort Shiro after accidentally triggering him. He ends up comforting himself a bit too in the process. And maybe getting a little closer than he meant to...





	But Like a Refugee

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Anthem by Leonard Cohen:  
>  _Every heart to love will come,  
>  But like a refugee_
> 
> Also: I wrote this after Shiro lost his original metal arm but before he got the new one, so that's what's described

 

Matt’s thought about kissing Shiro before. He usually imagines it happening in a moment of triumph, both of them coursing with adrenaline, both of them at their best. What he hasn’t thought about is almost kissing him, almost and then not, when both of them are at their worst and they have to let will outweigh desperation. That’s not the sort of thing Matt tends to daydream about. But it happens that he’s trying to pirate some movies from the Galra entertainment networks, while Shiro watches casually from the couch. Just movies to pass time, nothing that really needs doing. But he, like an idiot, has chosen to do it anyway. And then he, like an idiot, takes a wrong turn and pulls up some goddamn arena footage.

 

_ Something shrieks and swipes a claw, somebody’s bleeding on the ground, the crowd roars right into his ears and—  _

 

_ No, no, no _ . He needs to turn it off, needs to turn it off  _ now _ , but he’s frozen in place,  _ frozen again, oh my God,  _ needs to breathe, needs to move, and by the time his fingers obey him they’re shaking so violently that he can’t hit the key and was that, no, that wasn’t, it  _ can’t  _ have been—

 

The screen blinks off. Matt turns and sees Shiro sitting on the floor beside him, his hand slowly pulling back from the keyboard. His eyes are wide, still fixed on the spot where the scenes had played moments before.

 

“I’m— I’m sorry,” Matt says, breathing deeply, forcing himself to come back. “Shiro, I don’t know how that even—”

 

“That was me.”

 

_ Shit. _ He saw it too, then. 

 

“Yeah. It was. Shiro— ”

 

“I killed that person.”

 

“It was a...highlight reel, that was barely two ticks—”

 

“I killed them.”

 

“You don’t know the whole story.”

 

Shiro blinks a few times at that. Then his face forms into a scowl, which he turns to direct at Matt. “I didn’t hesitate,” he says. “I didn’t aim to disarm, or disable. I went right for the neck. Tell me what  _ missing piece _ would fix that.”

 

Matt takes a deep breath. He knows Shiro’s anger isn’t for him, and he’ll face it. But he needs to be careful not to make this worse. “Them,” he says. “The Galra. The way they made you do it.”

 

“It’s not like they could puppet me,” Shiro argues. “If they ever had that ability, they still would. And we checked.”

 

Matt shakes his head. “No, they’re not like that. They prefer to watch you struggle.” He tries to keep the bitterness out of his voice, but it creeps in anyway. “They’ll break you with starvation, or isolation, or planting stuff in your head that doesn’t belong there.” _Careful_ , he reminds himself, but his mouth moves faster. “Hold other prisoners hostage like the goddamn trolley problem come to life, and bet on what the _noble_ _slave_ will choose: if he’ll puke, cry, try to save everyone— ” 

 

_ Careful. _

 

He takes a deep breath, and another, to steady himself. “If you killed that person, Shiro,” he says, “it tells me a lot more about them than it does about you.”

 

Shiro looks at him, puzzled. “How do you know all this?”

 

“After I joined the Rebels, I asked to be placed on the prison break missions, and arena prisons in particular,” Matt says. He wonders why it feels like a confession. “It kind of...seemed like the least I could do. And I learned a lot about how they work.”

 

(He doesn’t mention how research, once a thrill and a pleasure, had taken on an edge of desperation, blurring the line between curiosity and compulsion in a way that hasn’t quite left him. He hasn’t mentioned that part to anyone, actually.)

 

Shiro shakes his head. “I know what they did, Matt, or I know enough to guess…” He looks like he’s forcing himself to concentrate, like he’s fighting a war in his head and just wants all the noise to stop. “But it’s not an excuse—”

 

“Ever been in solitary?” Matt says abruptly. 

 

Shiro frowns. “Probably? I don’t know.”

 

“Well, I have. So I can tell you myself that if you’re fresh out of a long enough stay in there, and they threaten to throw you back in...you compromise. Sometimes in ways you swore you wouldn’t. Or even if you swore you wouldn’t at all.”

 

Shiro’s face is instant sympathy, because he can do that for  _ others  _ just fine.

 

“Matt, I’m sorry, I-”

 

He throws up a hand. “Hey, I’m not saying this so you feel bad for me. Really. I’m saying it so you know I get it. Hell, I’ve  _ done _ it. And no, it’s not an excuse, but it’s a reason, and it doesn’t make you like them.”

 

He forces himself through the end of that sentence. Then he inhales calm and exhales tension, the way Shiro taught him years ago, before they’d ever even left the ground. “Might feel like it does, but it doesn’t,” he adds, and he makes his shoulders open back up, makes his body turn back to center, because this is  _ not  _ about him. But Shiro squeezes his hand anyway, because he’s Shiro and of course he does.

 

“You’ll forgive  _ me _ , then,” Matt says.

 

“It’s easier,” Shiro admits.

 

“That’s stupid, you know.”

 

“So I’ve been told”

 

Matt feels himself soften at Shiro’s face; there’s a small, tired smile on his lips, and for now he’ll count that as a victory. He twists his hand to maintain the grip, bumping arms in the process, then pulls them back to lean against the foot of the couch. To breathe, and breathe again.

 

“Can I tell you what  _ I _ remember about you there?” he asks after nearly a minute. His tone’s not quite relaxed, but no longer urgent.

 

“Something good, I hope,” Shiro replies. It comes out not entirely as a joke, but Matt snorts anyway.

 

“Yeah? How about the first day, when I couldn’t keep down the food they gave us, and then the next time they came to take you somewhere you returned with crackers and a piece of fruit stuffed in your clothes?”

 

“I did that?”

 

“You did. You said you picked it from another guard’s pockets. But first you caused a traffic jam in the hallway to make it harder to trace back to us.”

 

“Clever.”

 

“Yeah. Or the time you punched a guard in the nose for trying to take my dad away.”

 

“But they took him anyway.”

 

“Not the point. And I don’t need to mention the last time, do I?”

 

“I guess I’ve heard that one enough.”

 

Matt turns, and waits for Shiro to meet his gaze. “You resisted,” he says. “I saw it myself. From the reports I’ve heard, you kept resisting until the day you got out of there. But if every once in a while you couldn’t win, well….Shiro, that just means you’re human.”

 

At the word  _ human,  _ Shiro’s eyes dart to his metal shoulder; the lower extremity is gone, but it’s managed to swallow up more of him than before. He starts to roll it in a cautious circle before Matt stops him, his hand firm against the metal.

 

“You know I can’t feel that,” Shiro tells him.

 

“No? What about this, then?” Matt slides his hand up Shiro’s arm and around to his shoulder blade, pressing firmly into the warmth.

 

Shiro smiles gently and rolls his eyes. “Yes, I can feel that.”

 

“And this?” he asks, disentangling his other hand from Shiro’s to wrap it around his waist. Maybe it’s dumb, maybe it’s not the time, but  _ God,  _ he wants to be close right now.

 

Shiro hums, turning to face him, or possibly turning so that more of them can touch. “Feel that too,” he says.

 

“How about this?” Matt pulls Shiro closer, slowly, until their foreheads are pressed together. He brings his gaze to his lips and wonders, not for the first time, what it might be like. 

 

Then he pauses, because Shiro’s too vulnerable and because it would be too, too good. Instead, he lifts his face to kiss his forehead, then pulls away.

 

“Being chivalrous, are you?” Shiro teases him softly.

 

“Nah, that job’s all yours. I just wanted to make sure you’re good.”

 

He nods “I’m good.” Seeing Matt’s hesitation, he adds, “Really. I’d tell you if I wasn’t.”

 

Matt realizes it only as he says it: “Maybe I’m not, then. At least, not quite, you know? Not right now.” 

 

And he feels stupid; he was supposed to be the one to comfort Shiro, was supposed to be strong for him for once, but now it’s him who feels just a little too cracked open.

 

But Shiro nods, and he seems relaxed, and that’s not nothing. He lays his hand down on his leg and lets Matt reach out and take it, lets him press up against his shoulder while they breathe into the silence. And it’s nothing like Matt’s daydreams ever were. But he’ll take it.

**Author's Note:**

> As I said in the tags, I gave Matt my own issues, namely research compulsions. I didn't want to tag it OCD since it makes such a small appearance in the fic, but it's nasty, and a hard thing for a naturally inquisitive person to lose. But I got my love of learning back eventually, and I like to think Matt does too.


End file.
